Lexy Knott CEO & Co Owner of Group Benefits Designers Inc.
Mar 20, 2024
Alimond Studio
Ever felt the ground shift beneath your feet, leaving you scrambling for balance in your career? Our latest guest, a former massage therapist turned entrepreneurial force, shares her captivating journey of resilience and reinvention. From overcoming the sting of financial hardship to spearheading a business rooted in wellness and women's empowerment, her narrative is a treasure trove of wisdom for anyone facing their own pivot points.
When change is the only constant, how do you stay ahead of the curve? This episode peels back the layers of adapting to market shifts, the critical role of mentorship, and the art of transforming knowledge into action. Our guest doesn't just talk theory; she walks us through how embracing innovation and an entrepreneurial mindset played a pivotal role in transitioning from personal services to mastering the complexities of business ownership, even amid the whirlwind of AI revolutionizing industries.
Concluding with a powerful reflection on the ethos of abundance over scarcity, our guest extends an open invitation for mentorship, illuminating the path for others with her future-focused vision. Her story isn't just about business—it's a call to embrace self-grace, pursue growth, and share the wealth of experience. Tune in and let her insights spark your own transformation, whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur or simply seeking to navigate life's unpredictable tides with grace and strategy.
Ever felt the ground shift beneath your feet, leaving you scrambling for balance in your career? Our latest guest, a former massage therapist turned entrepreneurial force, shares her captivating journey of resilience and reinvention. From overcoming the sting of financial hardship to spearheading a business rooted in wellness and women's empowerment, her narrative is a treasure trove of wisdom for anyone facing their own pivot points.
When change is the only constant, how do you stay ahead of the curve? This episode peels back the layers of adapting to market shifts, the critical role of mentorship, and the art of transforming knowledge into action. Our guest doesn't just talk theory; she walks us through how embracing innovation and an entrepreneurial mindset played a pivotal role in transitioning from personal services to mastering the complexities of business ownership, even amid the whirlwind of AI revolutionizing industries.
Concluding with a powerful reflection on the ethos of abundance over scarcity, our guest extends an open invitation for mentorship, illuminating the path for others with her future-focused vision. Her story isn't just about business—it's a call to embrace self-grace, pursue growth, and share the wealth of experience. Tune in and let her insights spark your own transformation, whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur or simply seeking to navigate life's unpredictable tides with grace and strategy.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, so that's kind of always what I am trying to think what, how do I make money when I sleep?
Speaker 2:
Where did this? How did you get introduced to this mindset? Because sometimes it takes people until like never. Sometimes people never realize it's an option.
Speaker 1:
I know right. So in 2014, my husband bought a cleaning company. My background is I was a massage therapist, I was an esthetician, I was back in school psychology getting my degree. I'm at to be a clinical social worker. So in 2014, he said I need your help. And I'm like like, okay, but I know people. So I said, ok, well, I'll help you. I'm organized person, I'll help you. So I said all right, and it ended up being a two year thing.
Speaker 1:
But then the business went under and lost a lot of money, had to sell our house at a lot of debt, and I decided at that time after I grieved. I was just like with this whole process of grieving, because all the time you sacrifice away for your family, it's not just the money, it's just everything that you give up, and time moves forward. You can't get that back. So I said we owe people money. We're in an apartment. We hadn't been in an apartment since we were first married. How can I not only pay back people that I owe, but how do I buy a house within the next five years? Is it to open a psychology like a clinical therapist's office, or is it to take what I learned in the cleaning business and start over, and I decided I knew more on that business aspect of it. So I decided to take what I learned, go forward, and that's what I did. My husband did not do it with me and, honestly, I just became a vociferous reader.
Speaker 2:
I read the vociferous Obviously, I need to read more.
Speaker 1:
But I just read everything. My background is not business and I also changed the, the ways that I would speak about myself. I would not say I'm not a business person. I would say I am a business person and learning. And I just began to surround myself, in particular with women that knew more than I did, and surrounded those people that knew and that could help me. And I just read everything.
Speaker 2:
Where do you find these groups of women that know more than you do?
Speaker 1:
I think that you just have to open yourself up and you just have to be open and talk. And when you are out at any network event and just talk to women, what do you do? Where are you? How are things going, what's going on in your life? And people generally want to help and share, and that's just how I say, and I also say that it's on me now to share what I know with people. I say find your person, everybody has a person. Find them, just stick to them, yeah, and they'll help you. And everybody has a suggestion and it may work for you or it may not, but just try it out.
Speaker 1:
There was a book I read called Shoe Dog. They just made the Michael Jordan movie. Right, it took a little excerpt from that, but it was about Knight, that's the owner of Nike, about his story and his journey. I remember in the 80s playing sports wearing Nikes. They were about to go under. This million dollar company, 10 million dollar company could not make payroll. And I remember reading that book and I'm like I would have never thought Nike was about to go under because he didn't want to go public, he didn't want to do an IPO, and I just started thinking wow, you have to be on the razor's edge as a business owner, sometimes between complete failure and complete success. You don't want to live in that space constantly, but you have to be comfortable on it. And I realized when I saw that I'm like, okay, we all occupy that space to where sometimes we don't know what's going to happen and it can go one way or the other.
Speaker 2:
What's your biggest? I love that and I didn't. I haven't read that book yet. I actually gave myself two. I'm on two years now. I also used to be a what's the word Reader? The suffraress reader, I would say vicious reader.
Speaker 1:
You can be vicious. I like that too, right.
Speaker 2:
I would read so many books and somebody gave me advice or like stop reading so much and go implement. You take in way too much and then you're overwhelmed with ideas and then you're not taking action because now you're like onto the next book. So I really have not. I've still been collecting my books. I haven't been reading them, but like what in terms of like, like specifically from that book you said you have to be like on that razor edge of success and failure.
Speaker 2:
What did you, what do you take from that and how did you implement that specific?
Speaker 1:
to Be okay, to be in a place that's uncomfortable and to understand what fear is, and move past the fear and you may fail, but you have the ability to get up again, and I use this. Sometimes. I do public talks and I use this as an example. When the pandemic happened Mm-hmm, everybody is Quarantining. We weren't. We were out working doing a lot of decontamination spraying, but I was so envious of all that they other making bread, they're doing these TikTok videos or dancing. I'm like, okay, and I'm not here working. Yeah, and I'm not here working. I'm like you know what? I'm gonna start doing this. So I went, I got a on Amazon. I got a really cute outfit. I'm like I'm gonna just start jogging again and I'm like I'm just gonna. You know, I would look. I felt like I looked so cute. I had my little matching outfit, my shoes.
Speaker 1:
So I'm on Waxpool Road, which is a pretty busy road, and I'm just okay, I'm in the zone, I'm feeling good, nothing there. All of a sudden, I'm up and I'm on the ground and I am. I was well. Now, if I'm 20, I jump up immediately, like um who saw me, but I'm 50 and I said I'm just gonna lay here on the ground. I said I'm not moving to women, we're coming up. They're like oh my goodness, you okay. I'm like, yeah, I'm fine, I'm just gonna lay here, yeah. But I use that in business because that's the razor's edge. We fall, yeah, we can lay there for a little bit, eventually have to get up. People might step over you, people will help you up, but it's okay. And when I lost the other business, that was me laying on the ground for a bit because I had to grieve it, I had to take it in, I had to process it, and so I don't even know what your original question was but that that is what did you take from?
Speaker 1:
it, yeah, and that is exactly right to be. Okay. You don't always want to be in that space of the razor's edge, but understanding that when you're moving forward and making change, that's uncomfortable, not familiar. Sometimes it is between just a complete turn of failure, complete turn of success, but then also saying failure is not a failure, it's a learning opportunity, and that's what I try to tell my children. You have learning opportunities and the only way to do that is to explore and move forward.
Speaker 2:
So see what? What I took from this only because I've recently had conversations that are kind of connected to that is Like you were talking about. During the pandemic, you guys went into de-contamination mode like jobs. You probably didn't do too much of that before that none of it did none of it.
Speaker 2:
So what I took from that is you have to test and you have to be able to change. I'm not gonna use or pivot, because everybody uses that right, but you have to be able to, like you know, change courses and be okay with that. And some people that lost their business, they, they can't, they just cut it. They dug in. They dug in and they said this is the way I've always done it. If this way is no longer gonna work, then I guess it's time to move on, right and not and that's okay, but that's why you didn't that was a true failure, because you didn't learn anything from it and you weren't willing to test and figure out Okay, this, this way, this path is closed. We cannot go this way anymore. So you need to back up a little bit and try some other routes.
Speaker 1:
But here's the interesting thing about that. So I Pre-covid, 80% of my business was residential, 20% was small offices, not big facilities. And in January of 2020 I was helping another company build their residential side. But I said to him I had family in California, I'm watching what I came off of a cruise. I I know I had cove and they weren't calling it. Then in January and I said to him what are you gonna do when we shut down? And he's like what are you talking about my family's in California? They're like it's not in the news, quite like it is where you are. I'm thinking we're gonna have a two to three month shutdown, I'm not thinking a year or two. But I said to him what happens? Residential dies, what are you gonna do? So then I started thinking, and February I said I'm not gonna work with you anymore. I think we're heading to a situation I don't think you're prepared for. So I said well, what happens around here when we get snow? The chain lines are closed, we have no milk, we have no bread, right? So then I started talking to people well, what happens when we have a virus? What happens when we have the Novo virus? We spray?
Speaker 1:
I did not have the equipment. So I took a risk. I spent about $25,000, I bought equipment. But not only did I buy equipment, I bought enough product to last me for two years and I'm thinking it's going to be two months. But I said, let me go ahead and do it. So supply and demand people were saying they want to decon-spraying for businesses that could not operate from home. We were in some government facilities that did not have the ability to secure their workers a secure site at home. They had to go in. So through my connections and through my networking and relationships, I built when that happened in March residential. It shut down. People didn't want us in our homes. I completely got that. So our connections started working on contacts. Who do you know? What can we do? One of my contacts got me in touch with a government worker that contracts that would normally be $3,000 or $4,000 were going for $90,000, $80,000, $100,000 because there was a supply and demand. Wow, I felt guilty initially.
Speaker 2:
Why.
Speaker 1:
Right For having the foresight? Yes in that. And so I talked to my husband and I'm like I don't know why I'm feeling guilty, but I didn't feel guilty for long. So because I had an opportunity in Richmond and my daughter went to VCU, she worked as a sous chef and through college I said, can you get me 15 workers who's out of work, restaurant workers. I paid them $100 an hour so they were making it one day what they would make in a week.
Speaker 1:
Because it was dangerous. I was being, I had bounty. I thought, and let me share that bounty. And I did with them. And not only that Helped with your guilt, listen. I did listen. That guilt went away pretty quickly but I was able to provide not only a living for them and then I also was able to reinvest some of that money back into the residential. So we offered to nurses, grocery store workers, people that had to work to clean their house, at no charge the money I just reinvested. Then it allowed me to still give my employees work and so that kind of. Yeah, it was a risk, but it's a risk that paid off. My brother and I talked about it. He's like it's a little bit of luck. I'm like a little bit for sure. You know, luck is hard work, right Meeting opportunity. But there is something to that.
Speaker 2:
But yeah, that's amazing. Yeah, so it worked out. Yeah, I love that. So, yeah, not only did you obviously financially win, but, like you said, your team members that you brought in.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, it just allowed me to explode in a way that would have taken me five years. It took me in a year. So that's why I was just I worked so much, I was just so tired and that's why I was like, that's why I was like I'm going to run out there too, like all these people making bread on TikTok, but meanwhile I'm on the ground. But I did get up eventually.
Speaker 2:
It took me like three or four minutes but we like laying there and you're like this is going to make for a really good story, Exactly.
Speaker 1:
I know. No, I know. At first I'm like assess the damage. I don't care who sees me, it's okay, I'm not 20 anymore. Who cares Exactly? But it did. I started analyzing that I'm like that's really anything in life, not just business, it's anything. A relationship that fails. It could just be anything. And just change my mindset and stop saying I don't know business is. I am a business woman and how can I know more? I'm figuring it all out, yeah, yeah. So that book shoe dog attraction was big for me on how to run meetings, I agree with you. I only do one book a year. There are some that I reread in a year, but you're exactly right, you have to implement it.
Speaker 2:
So yeah, that's a big ground on mine, so I just now doing the audibles. Love audibles Because I listen to either podcast anyway, so I might as well.
Speaker 1:
So you do the audible and then you're like, okay, I'm going to go back and maybe read it.
Speaker 2:
Well, I'll always buy the books too from like. Amazon. So I'll buy the books and then I'll get it on audible when I realize that I'm not reading it. Yeah, the gray for road trips, exactly.
Speaker 1:
I'm the same way as you. I listen to all of those books on audible, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:
In terms of some other tips besides the luck and opportunity and having the foresight which I don't undervalue that at all, because it's not something that you can read about or I feel like either you're either a risk taker in general or you know, you just had that feeling of. You know, what if let me just go ahead and get ahead of the curve? What would you say that like? How did that come into play?
Speaker 1:
I think is if, whatever industry you are in or when a thought comes across your brain, it's an opportunity. Yeah, I think about mothers and when a baby carrier comes out with an update Makes sense. Makes sense that the carrier's not like that, they turn the handle. So there are things that cross our minds, that you already know that there's a gap in the market and how do you feel that? And I think if you just are aware and Proactive instead of reactive, and think about things that make your life easier or the any industry you know, just really think about what can come up in the market that changes the market, just being really touched in.
Speaker 1:
Yeah tuned in to what's going on.
Speaker 2:
Yeah and yeah and then I guess my biggest I'm picking back off of that is just be open to I'll just say it pivoting. Be open to like you can be in the same industry and that's like in for me. When people are like you know, what are you up to nowadays? I always hate that something doing the same thing.
Speaker 1:
The way I present it is in different ways, right, because otherwise Well, so I'll tell you one that people are fighting is this AI, and and I have family who are teachers I'm like it's here. Yeah, you know, when I was in school, they didn't allow us to have calculators and they said what do you think you're gonna walk around with a calculator in your hand all the time? Well, hello, yeah, come to find out?
Speaker 1:
Yes, we are right. So I talk to people in the Education how are you going to use AI to benefit your, the students? It's here, it's not gonna go back. It's the same with your business, right? How do you compete with photography and the AI? How do blog writers? How does that change? So, instead of fighting that change, how am I going to embrace it and make what I do better Correct? Yeah, that's exactly right. So I say stop fighting it, yeah, and implement.
Speaker 2:
You have to figure it out, yeah and then, even if it you might just be presenting what you do right during the pandemic, you present it in a different way. You're still cleaning it, but you're cleaning a different right of concern that these companies have not necessarily just the the Dust on a table, but rather like right virus. Yeah, exactly exactly In terms of a little bit about your story prior to the business. Like who were you as a kid growing up? Like what got you into this type of? That's funny, right.
Speaker 1:
I know. So I grew up in the South, I grew up in Alabama. I Michigan, alabama. I moved to Alabama when I was nine and moved up here to go to school, went to school from massage therapy Just have always enjoyed the body, the health, mental I'm.
Speaker 1:
I love therapy. I had a friend said you do way too much therapy, but anything with my kids. I'm like, okay, we're gonna go see the therapist, so it's just a safe space. So I, that's kind of how that's, that's my background as a health and wellness. So when I was doing the house cleaning I did ask myself it's not really what you would think, but how can I use what I know as psychology and people? How do I translate that into this business? How do I find my happiness? Because it's not like, oh joy, I have house cleaning. But I find that I give a good wage to these women, who can often be taken advantage of in terms of the fact that cultures are typically Central and South American women that do this work. Not only do they make a good wage, they make a very good wage and I give them opportunities for growth and business. I am really a women forward thinking business in that sense, and so that that's how I translate from from going from the health and wellness industry. How do I can help women and also, really, I am providing a service to homeowners. So that's my background is I'm Alabama girl.
Speaker 1:
It'll come out if I have too much to drink or I'm tired. So people say you don't have your accent. I'm like, yeah, I get a few drinks. A man, you might hear it, but I moved to Northern Virginia. I love this area. I love the diversity of the area, the opportunities that are here. Do I do them? No, now I stay home pretty much like, yeah, I know, if I want to go out to a concert, we'll book a concert and don't go. But yeah, pink, we had one for pink and it was raining and we're like, yeah, I don't think we're gonna go, so but yeah, I do love this area. I love London County. I love Virginia.
Speaker 2:
I love it If you could say something to your future clients, prospects, clients. What would you say to them?
Speaker 1:
As in you know. So here's the thing my goal is to do public speaking. I have a business coach that I do a certain amount. So what I say to women in particular, because that's my focus is you know more than what you realize. Reflect on where you are and where you're going to be, and allow yourself the grace that you give other people. That's what I would say. We're just so hard on ourselves.
Speaker 2:
I 100% agree. And so just really quickly, so you're doing more public speaking. How is that gonna help? So you're on stage, you speak to 5,000, 10,000 women. What next?
Speaker 1:
It is a way to reach more people. So if you can reach like, it is a like. How do you reach more people with a message that you want? Is it the speaking? Then do I write a book. So I had Pow Wad with another one of my coaches and we came up with the seven topics I could possibly speak on, anywhere from 10 minutes to 45 minutes to an hour and a half. I said, oh, I see the book. Some people do the book and then do the speaking. So I just want to take what I know and once again it's all based on the psychology, mental health, wellness and just share it. I have two lanes that I can go in. One is inspirational story, but also sometimes I go to those and I'm like, oh, that's nice, I like the inspiration, I really need some meat, meat potatoes, and so I have the meat potatoes on how to run a business and yeah, so like, if you empower them, you get them excited.
Speaker 2:
Are you gonna be offering coaching, offering the book, offering Eventually probably a book?
Speaker 1:
Yeah, no, I don't. What I say is it's my turn to give back and if I have, the-.
Speaker 2:
That's more of the. I just want to-.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, and if I can mentor you, absolutely, I have to say I was at another event and somebody came up to me. I lost her card. I feel so bad. I wish she would reach out to me, so and she hasn't. So if she's listening to this, I'm just like. But yeah, I'm like, absolutely. I even met with a gentleman about how to start a cleaning company. I'll tell you whatever you want to know. Some people guard the information. I'm like there's enough for everybody. Operate on abundance, not scarcity. So I'll tell you whatever you want. Now, telling and doing are two separate things. Yes, man, and only what is often a scene is the end result, but not the result. There is no overnight success. There's not Even people that go on American Idol. Typically they've been singing, they've been doing something, something three years old.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, exactly, exactly. So I love that. Thank you so much for being on the podcast and sharing a little bit about your story and your future growth.
